If you’re a beer lover (like me) and if you live in Israel
(like me), you must have noticed that the last five or so years have been kind
to us.
The Israeli beer culture is booming. Stores and restaurants and pubs now offer the
beer-drinking public a heady assortment of local and imported beers of all
types and variations: ales and lagers, stouts and wheats, dubbels and tripels,
fruits and bitters. Go into almost any
liquor store and you can’t help but notice that more and more shelf space is
taken up by a rainbow choice of beers from all over the world.
Home brewing is also taking off. There are more places to buy equipment and
ingredients to begin brewing beer in your own kitchen. It’s a serious hobby in which, like stamp
collecting or playing golf, you can invest as much time, interest and money as
you want. And the end result is not a lower
handicap, but 19 liters of delicious and inexpensive beer.
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Amitai seems more interested in the beer than in grandpa. |
But most of all, boutique breweries (also known as craft
breweries) have been springing up all over the country, liberating Israeli
brew-quaffers from the duopoly of industrially-brewed, flavor-deficient beers. No more is the choice between Tempo Beer
Industries (Goldstar, Nesher and Maccabee) or Israel Beer Breweries Ltd. (Carlsberg and
Tuborg). They may hold the major share
of the market, but not of the taste. Independent small breweries are changing the
way Israelis think about beer. People
who have been saying, “No, I don’t drink beer” all of their lives, are now
saying, “Hmm. That one’s good!” Just ask
my wife Trudy.
Today, there are over 20 licensed commercial boutique
breweries in Israel. The first one was probably Dancing Camel in
Tel Aviv, opened in 2006 by American immigrant David Cohen. David’s bandanaed head is a familiar sight at
beer festivals and other social events, and his beautiful beers are readily
available at many liquor stores and bars.
The most recent boutique brewery may be Herzl Beers in Jerusalem
– but I really can’t say because another one may be opening somewhere in Israel
as I write these words.
Unfortunately, at the same time, others may be closing. Which brings me to my last point for this
posting: As the competition among craft beers heats up, sadly there will be
casualties. In order to survive, brewers
will need more than an excellent product and a presence at beer and food
fairs. They have to be skilled marketers
who get their beers into shops, restaurants and pubs. Price is important too, but, as whiskey and
wine sellers will tell you, Israelis are ready to pay for quality. The sales tax on beer in Israel
is quite high. Although it affects all
beer sales, it hits the small craft brewers harder, since the industrial
brewers have the volume to absorb part of the tax.
I recently noticed six packs of Butterfly beer (brewed in
the Ramat Dalton industrial estate in the Upper Galilee)
on sale near the Machane Yehuda shuk for only NIS
30! I tried to contact Butterfly to find
out how they could sell their beer at such a ridiculously low price – not that
I was opposed at all! I became
suspicious when the phone number and the website both weren’t working. I did some research and discovered (without
much surprise) that Butterfly had gone out of business a few months
earlier. The remaining beer was
obviously being dumped on the market to be sold at any price.
Butterfly had its fans, but I found only the Sunset (dark
ale) swallowable. That may help to
explain why Butterfly went belly up. I
don’t know. But our craft breweries must
remember that they are now competing against each other, and not only against
the big guys. They will have to give us,
the beer drinkers, the best beer at the best price. It’s a jungle out there.
Hey, just discovered this blog while searching Google for info on Herzl Brewery. (You're the only site that comes up in English!) I sincerely hop (sic.) you stick around -- you've only made two posts, it seems, but already are a valuable resource. Speaking of Jerusalem brewers, recently I heard about one in the Nahlaot area of the city called Teverya Street Beer. Haven't had a chance to check them out in the flesh, and they seem more into standard brews than craft ones like Herzl...but the more the merrier. There's finally starting to be a true local boutique brewing scene in our capital.
ReplyDeleteThanks, whoever you are. I definitely intend to stick around. If you can find out any more about Teverya Street Beer, I'd like to know. I want my web log to be as inclusive as possible -- for any good beer, of course.
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